The approach to Bisley, home to the National Rifle Association for over a hundred years, is roads that are widened and twisting country lanes, often through woodland. One then enters an area so leafy and green it would give most golf courses a run for their money and is probably bigger than many, the estate has over 3000 acres with an abundance of natural woodland. Some of the buildings within the grounds are from the Victorian era and are colonial style. And on July 18th, it became the location where our erstwhile shooting squad of 5 with 1 reserver assembled for the Schools Veterans (Target Rifle) competition. A pleasant sunny afternoon – the prone position shooting requires is challenging when wet – put us all in a good mood.

Between us, we comprised 4 decades of College leavers, some who had not seen each other since leaving school.  Representing the college were Chris Bee, Wim Hulme, Rifat Khan, John Clegg, David Newcomb and Jonathan Newcomb. John Wood's father won the King's Prize in 1933 and he took pride in showing us an original cigarette card recording this feat.

We were using a 7.62 round in a single shot, bolt action rifle, with the targets 500 yards away. After each shot an adjustment is made for windage (making shots go more left or right) and elevation (up or down) by the shooter's partner, the spotter, who uses a scope. There is a person in the butts under the target, who pulls the target down and marks the bullet hole with a fluorescent sticker, before raising it up for the spotter and score keeper to record the location and score respectively.

The squad shared David's rifle, which has a barrel from 1919. Jon Clegg kindly stayed as spotter for the duration of our shoot spotting for himself on his own equipment when the time came.

Chris Bee was first to shoot. He felt his first sighter was good in spite of being a magpie (score 3) so John Clegg made a sight adjustment based on that. The next shot was an inner (score 4) and then a bull. The rest of his shoot was inners and bulls scoring him an impressive 45.2 with 3 bulls and 2 inner bulls.

Next up was Wim Hulme, our newest regular member. This is only the second time he has shot since school. He started really well by converting his second sighter bull and following it up with a collection of magpies and inners giving a score of 39.0. He improved by 10 points over last year's score.

Rifar Khan followed Wim with one inner bull and 2 outer bulls and the rest inners, we'll ignore the magpie for the first shot and call it freak wind scoring a very respectable 42.1.

It was Clegg's turn now. He was shooting in the Imperial competition so the sights on his rifle were already set. He got 3 inner bulls and 2 outer bulls finishing on 45.3.

Jonathan Newcomb is the newest addition to the team. I offered him my place as the final shooter but he declined this time in favour of being the team photographer. So I went last. I too converted my second sighter but continued with 2 inner bulls straight after. It looked like I was going to be on for an all time best but sadly it dipped in the middle and didn't quite recover. Still two inner bulls and two outer bulls and a score of 44.2 isn't bad for me.

All shooters were on target and within time and our customary race from the bottom (we were second to last, last year) saw our position in the rankings improve to 8th from last.

This is not a bad result for a group of people spanning several decades, most of whom shoot once a year, when the competition often wears custom made clothing and uses precision target rifles costing thousands of pounds.

We then went to the nearby London & Middlesex bar (on the Bisley grounds) for a pint or two and a bit of reminiscing. The stories centred around “when I was at school,” always interesting given the decadal difference of the shooters. Due to the distance most travel to represent the college, it was a pleasant but not late night.